It’s our great pleasure to share the following final report from Burnaby, Canada, which mentions her reflection to the whole of her study abroad for one year.  Sora, an exchange student at Burnaby Mountain Secondary, will share it as follows:

Long time no see, there. I am Sora. I am an exchange for one year in Burnaby Mountain Secondary School. I think this is my last report because I will go back to Japan soon. Then, I will look back on my study abroad in this report.

I have learned a lot of things from this one-year exchange in Canada. When I came here, I was just thinking that I could come to Canada and it would be fun to stay here. However, the reality was different from what I had expected, which reminded me of lots of suffering experiences.

The first thing was my English ability. I was surprised at my friends I knew in Canada have a lot of vocabulary and they can explain words meanings in English. I can understand what the word means in Japanese, but it is difficult for me to explain in detail in English.  I heard from my teacher that Japanese and Chinese guys are not good at these things.

Second, other languages except Japanese have pronunciation of R and L. We do not have these pronunciations, so my English is too bad to make myself understood in English. They speak English like a native speaker.  However, it is difficult for them to pronoun Japanese “tu”. When some people from not Japan said “tu”, it sounds very cute because they will say “tyu” . I was able to learn difference in culture from this thing. Originally, I liked learning about foreign countries, so this is a great opportunity for me to study and feel many different cultures.

Finally, I am going to talk about a way of thinking. I had lived all through my life in Japan until I went to Canada for this studying abroad. Therefore, when I came to Canada, I was very surprised that everyone has feel differently and they always express their own opinion to everyone.  In addition to that, they respect each other for their racial differences.  I think that I was able to learn how important it is because Canada has been  the nation of multinational cultures. I am so glad to be here for studying in Canada, and I will make use of this experience when I go back to Japan.

Once again, I would like to give my very special thanks to all of you for reading my report.